


Accept What You Cannot Change

by fourteencandles (thingsbaker)



Series: Parallel Worlds [2]
Category: Entourage
Genre: M/M, billy walsh would make a great cat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-15
Updated: 2015-04-15
Packaged: 2018-03-23 01:42:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3750232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thingsbaker/pseuds/fourteencandles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lloyd gasped. “Oh my God, you really are a body-switched Eric!”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is the companion to Best of Both Worlds, both posted to Livejournal in 2008, and both beta-read by shoshannagold.

Eric woke to the noise of the ocean. He groaned and reached out, expecting to feel sand or sleeping bag, trying to remember if they’d staggered out to the beach last night after drinking, but instead felt nothing but a wide expanse of soft bed and silk-smooth sheets. He opened his eyes: he was in bed. A huge bed, in a huge room. An unfamiliar room. He sat up and gasped. Where the fuck was he? Where the —

“Good morning!” Lloyd’s bright voice was unmistakable. The double doors at the far end of the room swung open and Lloyd — in a dark suit with a morning tie — strode in, carrying an espresso cup in one hand and a sheaf of newspapers in his other.

“Lloyd?” Eric gasped, and then looked at the rumpled bed next to him. He clutched the sheet a little tighter to his bare chest. “Uh — what the fuck?”

Lloyd stopped dead, still ten feet from the bed. His eyes went wide. “I’m sorry,” he said, ducking his head, “am I early? I didn’t — I’m so sorry, I would never wake you if —”

“Lloyd, stop,” Eric said. Whatever was going on, clearly it wasn’t Lloyd’s fault. This was clearly some kind of prank, the guys were messing with him. Or maybe — maybe he’d had more to drink last night than, well, than ever before. “I’m not — I didn’t mean you. I’m —” He shook his head. “It’s fine, I’m awake. What’s, uh, what’s going on?”

Lloyd gave him a quick, evaluative look, then stepped hesitantly forward. He handed Eric the espresso and paused, and Eric realized he was supposed to drink it. He did, fast, like a shot, and then handed the cup back, struggling not to make a face. He was a latte man. Lloyd spread the papers —  _Variety_ , the  _Hollywood Reporter_ , both the  _L.A._  and  _New York Times_ , the  _Wall Street Journal_ , and a few neighborhood papers that Eric couldn’t guess his interest in — out in a fan on the bed, expertly, apparently well practiced. Eric continued to gape at him, and Lloyd looked back, expectant and oddly humble. Something totally fucking weird was going on.

“Is this some kind of joke?” Eric asked.

Lloyd flinched. He reached out and straightened the  _L.A. Times_  so that it was even with the other papers. “I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t —”

Eric rubbed his face. “Please stop apologizing,” he said, and Lloyd shut up instantly. OK, that was nice. Eric looked up. Maybe he wasn’t fucked up — maybe the world was fucked up. "Lloyd, if I tell you something, right now, do you promise not to freak out?”

“That’s what the confidentiality agreement says I swear.”

“Oh. OK,” Eric said. He paused. The espresso was already working; his hands felt a little jittery. At least his voice sounded right. “I’m, uh, I’m not where I’m supposed to be.”

Lloyd’s eyes went wide, again, and he drew a Blackberry from his pocket. “Sir, I rescheduled the UA meeting like I thought you said, I —”

“That’s not what I mean,” Eric said, then sighed. “OK. I think, maybe this will work better in a few minutes. I’m going to get up, take a shower, and meet you in the kitchen in, say, fifteen minutes. OK?”

“What should I tell him you’d like?”

“Who?”

“Andre,” Lloyd said.

Eric blinked. “Andre.”

“Chef Andre.”

There was a chef? Ari didn’t have a chef. Where the fuck was he? “Uh. Maybe, just a bagel?”

“In place of the usual or in addition?” Lloyd asked.

“Uh, whatever,” Eric said, “whatever’s easiest.”

Lloyd nodded. “Fifteen minutes in the kitchen.”

He turned and left the room with a militaristic spin that freaked Eric out a little. When the doors were closed, Eric climbed out of bed, grabbed a heavy robe hanging nearby, and looked around. This was the largest bedroom he’d ever been in, maybe ever seen, and it was also, perhaps, the least inviting. There were tall bookshelves along one wall with lines of antique-looking books and small clusters of awards; a flat-screen television took up most of another wall, with a sofa angled in front of it, before a coffee table with three neat stacks of script pages. A huge painting of wide boats on a green sea hung just behind the bed, which had matching green linens and looked like it was possibly two King-sized beds combined. Vince must be doing insanely well to afford us staying here, he thought, and then he realized where he was.

This was the what-if.

“Ha,” he whispered, looking around. This was what Vince could have had, if he’d listened to Eric all those years ago. Eric felt a warm swell of pride and laughed to himself. Wait until he found the bastard.

The bathroom was just as palatial and spare — gleaming white and green marble tiles, a bathtub large enough to sail in, a shower with twelve heads, two benches, and eight different kinds of shampoo in elegant dispensers, and a mirror that showed he was definitely not Ari. After a shower and a shave — with an honest-to-God pearl-inlaid razor — Eric walked back into the bedroom and realized he had no idea what to wear. Well, couldn’t be that hard to figure out, he thought, and soon stumbled into a room, maybe the size of his bedroom in the normal house, full of shirts, slacks, and expensive shoes. He picked a green T-shirt and a white button-down to go over it, going with the room’s theme, and a pair of gray slacks under that. No label. Tailor-made. Nice.

By the time he made it to the kitchen, it had probably been twenty minutes, maybe longer. Lloyd looked panicked. “What is it?” Eric asked, concerned.

“I thought I’d misheard,” Lloyd said. “I thought —”

“Lloyd, take it easy, all right?” Eric said, patting his shoulder, and Lloyd gaped at him. Eric started to ask what that was about when he noticed the plate of food sitting on the butcher’s block just behind Lloyd.

A single biscuit with sausage gravy sat next to a perfectly poached egg; two half-dollar pancakes shared space with a small round of hashbrowns; and a bagel, with a perfectly even layer of cream-cheese with real blueberries smashed in, sat on the next plate over.

“Holy shit,” Eric said. Even the juice — which looked to be fresh-squeezed pomegranate — was artfully displayed, with an orange slice cut into the shape of a flower clipped on the rim.

“Is it OK? I didn’t know about the blueberry cream cheese, but they only had frozen strawberries.”

“This looks amazing.” Eric sat in front of it, and Lloyd hovered. He glanced up. “Do you want some?”

“No,” Lloyd said, too quickly.

Eric took a deep breath. “Let’s, before I get to this, let’s talk, Lloyd, OK? Have a seat.”

To his surprise, after Lloyd sat down, he started to cry. “I knew it, I knew this was coming,” he said. “I’m so sorry, E — I mean, Eric, Mr. Murphy, I did everything the best I could, I know it wasn’t always good enough —”

“Lloyd!” Eric reached out and squeezed his shoulder. “Jesus, I’m not firing you.”

“You’re not?”

“No! You’re — Lloyd, you’re an amazing — whatever it is you are,” he said, and Lloyd smiled through his tears. “Seriously. No. I wanted — I was going to tell you something, remember?”

“Oh. Yes. Of course.” Lloyd reached for his Blackberry, and Eric flinched. “No notes?” Lloyd said, and Eric shook his head.

“You won’t need them,” he said.

He told Lloyd the whole story, from the elevator ride to waking up in the monstrous bed. “So I need to know what’s going on,” Eric said. “You know? This is a whole new life for me.”

Lloyd’s brow furrowed. “Is this — some kind of movie you’re pitching?”

“No, Lloyd, it’s real life,” Eric said. “And why would I be pitching a movie? Where is Vince, anyway?”

“At the gym until 9:10,” Lloyd said, almost like a recording. “He’s probably just finishing the weight room, should I —”

“No, no, it’s fine.” Eric picked up his fork. “You’re sure you don’t want some of this?”

“I’m allergic,” Lloyd said, looking at the food, and Eric looked down, too.

“To eggs?”

“To egg substitue,” Lloyd said, and when Eric flinched Lloyd gasped. “Oh my God, you really  _are_  a body-switched Eric!”

“You got that from the eggs?”

Lloyd twirled the plate and pointed at each item. “Vegan gravy over low-carb biscuit; organic hashbrowns cooked in grapeseed oil with no salt; poached fake egg; mango spears with cinnamon, very good for your heart; and flax-seed pancakes with no syrup.”

Eric tapped the bagel. “This?”

“Whole grain, locally grown, with toasted oatmeal. The cream cheese was handmade by Andre, all organic, with fat-free milk.”

“Jesus.”

“Your blood pressure was a little high a year ago, that’s when you hired Andre.”

Eric took a bite of the bagel, which was really quite delicious. “When did I hire you?”

“Four years ago.”

“And I still make you cry?”

Lloyd shrugged. “You’re demanding,” he said. “But you’re brilliant.”

“Me?” Lloyd stared at him. “Lloyd, what am  _I_  brilliant at?”

“You’re only the most sought-after director in Hollywood!”

Eric didn’t have time to respond to that, because Vince suddenly walked into the kitchen. Lloyd gasped, and Eric nearly had the same reaction. Vince looked — well, he looked angry, but he also looked beautiful. Actually fucking beautiful. Eric had lived with the guy for ten years, lived next to him forever before that, and he knew Vince had his moments. Vince had a great face and a great metabolism, but he’d always been pretty casual about his body. He worked out when he had to, he bulked up or trimmed down for movies, and on the set, on the screen, he was, sometimes, exactly as hot as everyone thought he was. At home, he was usually a different creature, laying around in dirty jeans, brushing his hair at the last minute, loathe to shave, just casual about everything.

This was a different Vince. The Vince standing in front of him was wearing flat, tailored black slacks and a silky green shirt; his hair, in loose dark waves just at chin-length, looked silky and possibly freshly, expertly styled; his eyes were brighter than usual, and Eric suspected contacts; his fingernails were manicured, and Eric saw a gold band on his left hand. His face was just thin enough that his cheekbones seemed higher than usual, and his arms were clearly muscular under the fine material.

He looked like a movie star. More than that: he looked like a grown up. And he looked fucking hot. This was Vince at his best — this was his full physical potential, Eric realized, and it was all he could do not to let his mouth drop open. 

But Vince was more than just physically hot: he looked, Eric saw, mad as hell. “What the fuck, Eric?” he said.

Eric coughed. “What the fuck what?” Eric picked up his glass, and that’s when he saw it — the ring on his own finger. How did he miss it up until now? He was married?  _Vince_  was married? 

Vince was glaring at him like they were about to get in a fist fight. He tipped his head, including Lloyd in the glare, and Lloyd squeaked. Eric understood, because he didn’t want to be caught in the middle of whatever was about to come, either. “It’s OK,” Eric said, and Lloyd nodded and practically hurtled out of the room. Worse came to worse, he’d just tell Vince the truth.

“Trent,” Vince said.

Eric couldn’t think of any Trents. He took a sip of his juice, and waited for more information. He’d eat the whole plate one tiny bite at a time if he had to, to avoid having to say anything.

“Trent, my  _bodyguard_ ,” Vince snarled. That was a tone Eric had really only heard a few times. Vince was furious. Eric cut a wedge of pancake and chewed it very slowly. It was dry, tasted kind of nutty. Vince recrossed his arms. “You’re just not going to say anything?”

Eric swallowed. “What do you want me to say?” Please, tell me, he thought.

“I want — what does it matter what I want?” Vince asked. “Apparently nothing, right? Apparently.”

“Just tell me what you’re talking about,” Eric said.

“He told me about your little meetings.” Vince was practically thrumming with anger — his fingers were drumming on his arms. They both had rings.  _Matching_  rings. Eric blinked and looked up. He remembered the big bedroom, the big closets. Made for two. Made for them. Oh,  _yes_ , Eric thought, fighting back a grin. Vince, this hot perfect Vince, and this beautiful house, and — yes.

“Pay attention!” Vince said, slamming his hands on the table. “I know you have eighty seven thousand meetings to get to, I know you’ve got all your plans, but for one minute, Eric, engage with me, here. Pretend you fucking care that I’m upset, that I’m trying to tell you something.”

“What?” Eric said. “I’m — I swear I’m listening. I was just — I’m sorry. Distracted.”

“Not distracted. Avoiding,” Vince said. “You don’t want to talk about the fact that you’re paying someone to spy on me.” He took a few steps closer. “Spying, Eric! How does it even work — does he get extra if he tells you some juicy detail? Is this why you were so pissed about my lunch with Jess last week, because he told you some fucking lie about it?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Eric said, honestly, spreading his hands.

“Oh, fuck you,” Vince said. “This shit is sick, Eric. If someone else was doing this, you know what would happen? You know what we’d do, we’d fucking call the cops. You’re  _stalking_  me,” he said, and Eric heard something under the anger that was worse — he heard desperation, and maybe a little fear.

“I’m not,” Eric said. “I don’t — I didn’t mean —”

“Whatever,” Vince said. Eric slid off his chair and put out a hand, just to stop Vince from rushing past him, but Vince flinched away from him, knocking into the cabinets, and then walked back out the way he’d come.

Lloyd tiptoed in a second later, while Eric was still standing with his arm out. “Oh dear,” he said, and Eric looked over at him.

“What the fuck was that?” he whispered. 

“You’ve been spying on him,” Lloyd said. 

Eric sat down again. “Maybe you should start at the top.”

So then he got the full story. He’d come to L.A. when Vince had, fifteen years ago, and he’d worked catering somewhere and managed to push Vince’s audition tape into the right hands. From there, he’d sculpted Vince’s career in a way similar to how Ari had run things: commercials, then small parts in films, then a commercial success not unlike _Head On_. That was where the stories changed. Eric had still found  _Queens Boulevard_ , but there was no Billy.

“Wait, no Billy Walsh?” Eric asked, and Lloyd frowned.

“Your cat?”

Eric rubbed his head. “We have a cat named Billy Walsh?”

Lloyd nodded. “After some crazy guy you met at a party. It’s a pretty ugly cat.”

“I’ll bet,” Eric said, shaking his head. “Go on.”

Entrenched in Hollywood culture and tired of taking shit from their agent, Vince and Eric had produced  _Queens Boulevard_  themselves, and Eric, having endured seven years of sitting on set with Vince, directed it. It killed at Sundance, and by the time they left there, they were both stars — and they were outed, thanks to a celebratory kiss at one of the panel discussions.

Lloyd led Eric into the den to complete the story, and Eric gasped. There were two Oscars gleaming on the bookshelves, next to a Golden Globe; there was also a picture of them from the front of  _Vanity Fair_ , Vince’s chin resting on Eric’s shoulder, their arms tangled together over Eric’s chest, the headline: The New Power Couple. The pictures on the wall showed Eric and Vince with any number of other famous people, even, in one shot, with a presidential candidate. “Jesus,” Eric said.

“You’re very sought-after,” Lloyd said, standing primly by the door.

Eric took a seat on a leather couch. He couldn’t really believe he was famous yet, so he focused on the stuff that seemed most important. “What’s the story with Vince?”

“You’ve been paying his bodyguard, Trent, to report to you on what he’s doing.”

“Why?” Lloyd shrugged, and Eric said, “This is no time to be delicate, Lloyd.”

“You think he’s cheating on you,” Lloyd said.

“Is he?”

“I doubt it,” Lloyd said. “Trent hasn’t seen anything.”

“I’m pretty hard on him, huh?”

Lloyd shrugged. “You have your ups and downs.”

Eric closed his eyes. “He seemed pretty fucking angry. And it kind of sounds like he has the right.” Lloyd didn’t say anything; when Eric opened his eyes again, Lloyd was looking tastefully away. That answered that; this was all his — well, this Eric’s fault. He cleared his throat. “What about the guys?” Lloyd looked confused. “Turtle, Drama.”

“Last I heard, Turtle was working at the Nike Store,” Lloyd said.

Eric laughed. “Turtle, working?”

“He’s pretty broke, with the lawsuit,” Lloyd said. When Eric glanced across, Lloyd said, “Sorry, I forgot. You’re suing him. The papers were filed earlier this year.”

“Sue — I’m  _suing_  Turtle?”

“He took thousands of dollars of merchandise intended for you and Vince and sold it for his own personal gain,” Lloyd said. “He cheapened your image.”

“Was that in the court filing?” Lloyd nodded. “Jesus fucking Christ. I’m a real asshole, huh? Where’s Drama? I’m maybe stalking Vince, his brother’d have something to say about it.”

Lloyd frowned. “Half brother. You had a test administered, before —” He paused and looked away.

“Oh, what, Lloyd? Cut the dramatics, can you?”

“He’s missing. Just up and left, three years ago.” Lloyd looked sideways again. “There are rumors of suicide.”

Eric felt light-headed. Drama had run away, maybe killed himself? Drama wasn’t Vince’s brother? “He — because I —” Eric tried to choke out.

Lloyd shrugged. “He’d also recently been fired from his TV show.” Eric looked up, and Lloyd blinked. “You might have had something to do with it.”

“Jesus,” Eric whispered. “Oh, Jesus.”

“Are you all right?”

“No,” he said, “no, I’m — I’m evil, here. I’m worse than Ari.” He rubbed his face. “Why is Vince still with me?”

“I’ve always assumed the sex was amazing,” Lloyd said, and Eric groaned. “Plus you can really be very charming.”

“Sure.” Eric sat back. He felt like he might throw up, or like he might need to throw something. He closed his eyes and prayed: Let the world go back to normal. When he opened his eyes, he saw only Lloyd in front of him. Even that felt like too much of an audience. “Listen, can you, uh, whatever I have today, can I get out of it? I mean — I don’t think I’m up to —”

“I can do that,” Lloyd said. He glanced at his watch. “I should do that now.”

“Good,” Eric said. “I need a minute.”

After Lloyd left, Eric looked around the room. It was full of these trophies, these signs of success, and everything within made him sick. What the fuck, he thought. How had they gotten here? How had — he swallowed, seeing the smile on Vince’s face in the framed photo. Well, OK, he thought. He’d seen movies like this —  _Groundhog Day_  came to mind — where the character had to make some major shift, come to some realization, set certain things right — before he could move on. Eric was going to do exactly that: set things right, as fast as he fucking could. He’d be flying blind in this Eric’s life, but with Lloyd’s help, he could probably get things figured out.

And, at the very least, he knew where to begin.

Vince was in their bedroom, pulling clothes from one of the closets. Eric stopped just inside the door.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“I’m leaving,” Vince said. The shirt he was holding shook just a little in his hand.

Eric nodded. “Where are you going?”

“New York,” Vince said. “I’ll stay in the apartment.” He threw the shirt onto the bed and crossed his arms again. “Say something, Eric.”

“You should,” Eric said. “Leave me, I mean.” Vince blinked. “I’m an asshole.”

Vince smirked. “That isn’t going to work,” he said, and turned back to the closet.

“I don’t — I’m not trying to talk you out of it,” Eric said, sitting on the bed. He picked up a shirt and started folding it. “Things are pretty bad, huh?”

“Whose fault is that?” Vince said from inside the closet.

“Mine,” Eric said. He closed his eyes, tried to imagine what the thing to say would be. What would this Eric not give? The truth. “I’m jealous. I’m greedy. I’m controlling,” he said.

Vince walked out and leaned on the doorjamb. “Go on,” he said.

Eric looked down. “I’m mean,” he said. “Cruel, even. To you. To everyone.” Vince didn’t say anything. “I do love you, though.”

He was surprised when Vince sat next to him. “That’s never been our problem,” he said softly, and then he said Eric’s name. Eric had the feeling that something very bad was coming. Why did Vince keep calling him Eric, anyway?

“Vince,” he said. He reached out and put his hands over Vince’s. It felt awkward, but it was exactly what he would have done if he was having this conversation with his girlfriend, and Vince didn’t pull away. “I’m sorry,” he said.

“For what?” 

Eric understood this was a test, and he knew, instantly, there was no way he could pass. “For the stuff with Trent. That was fucked up, and I will never do that again.” Vince didn’t move. There was more, he was sure, so much more to be sorry for, but he didn’t know enough yet. “Shit, Vince, I’m sorry for everything,” he said. He was surprised when Vince reached out and drew his face up. Vince was looking at him with very little hope but a painful amount of earnestness. 

“I don’t understand how we got here,” he said.

“Me either,” Eric said. He swallowed, surprised to find he was close to tears. “Is there any way, you think, that we could — not be here?”

Vince frowned. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t think so.”

“What about — counseling?” Eric asked.

Vince flinched. “ _Now_  you want to go to counseling? I asked you two years ago, you remember what you said?”

Eric shook his head.

“You said you’d rather be dead than pay someone to tell you how to live with me.” Vince drew back. “You said if I felt the need to flap my jaw, I could just suck you off more often.”

“Jesus,” Eric said, and he covered his own face. “Holy fuck, I’m a bastard.”

“That’s news,” Vince said. 

“Stay here.” Vince started to talk, but Eric talked over him. “Stay in the house. I’ll go, uh, I’ll leave. OK?” Vince looked surprised, and Eric kept talking while he had the advantage. “Let’s at least be in the same town.”

“Eric,” Vince said, but he sounded tired, not angry.

“Just stay,” Eric said. “I’m going to fix this.”

Vince shook his head, but he said OK. Eric sensed that this was the limit, that he couldn’t push Vince for anything else, so he stood. He touched Vince’s face, but Vince kept looking down. “I’ll go,” he said, and walked out of the bedroom, closing the door carefully behind him.

Lloyd was waiting in the living room. “I need a place to stay,” Eric said.

“The suite at the Beverly Hilton?”

“No,” Eric said, glancing back down the hall. “Somewhere quiet. Somewhere no one will see me. And — clear up what I’ve got this week, OK? I need to focus on this.”

“This?”

Eric blinked. “He’s leaving me.”

Lloyd snapped out his phone. “I’ll order the flowers. New car? He liked that Porsche last month from —”

“No,” Eric said. “Lloyd. This isn’t just a fight. This is — I’m going to fix this. I’m going to turn this around. For real. No buying him anything, no trying to smooth it over.” 

Lloyd slowly tucked away his cell phone. “So — what do you want to do first?”

Eric sighed. “Take me to Turtle.” Lloyd nodded. “And get my lawyer on the phone.”

“Which one?”

By the time they reached the Nike Store, Lloyd had given him a complete briefing on the Turtle situation and Eric had everything worked out. Maybe he wasn’t a Hollywood Superstar in his usual world, but he knew how to get stuff done on the fly, and here, he didn’t even have to drop Vince’s name to make people jump. They stopped at a Kinkos en route and took over the fax machine, then emerged with a folder full of papers that Eric carried into the Nike Store. 

Turtle was helping a teenaged boy try on shoes while the boy’s mother fretted over the cost. Eric watched them from the end of the aisle, saw that Turtle was really working to be kind even though the mother was becoming increasingly negative and the kid was getting whiny.

“I’m not paying a hundred and fifty dollars just so you can not make the basketball team again,” the mother said, and Eric stepped forward.

“Aw, great,” Turtle said, shaking his head and gathering crumpled stuffing paper into a shoe box.

“Who’re you?” the woman asked.

“He’s no one,” Turtle said, and Eric stepped forward.

“I’m in management,” Eric said. “This is my assistant, Lloyd.”

“Hello,” Lloyd said.

“I really need to borrow this guy for a second,” Eric said, and Turtle rolled his eyes.

The woman crossed her arms. “We were here first.”

Eric nodded. “You let me borrow him, I’ll pay for your shoes. Whatever you want. Lloyd, could you help her out?”

The woman blinked, then grabbed her son by the arm. “Come on,” she said, and Lloyd led them to the front counter.

Turtle closed the shoe box. “Real slick,” he said. “Buying some new friends?”

“Is there somewhere we could talk?”

“Like court?”

Eric sighed. “Give me five minutes,” he said. “I’m not fucking with you. Five minutes and I’ll make this all go away.”

Turtle picked up the box and tilted his head, and Eric followed him across the store, back into the storeroom. “So talk,” Turtle said. “But there are cameras around, you should know, in case you’re pulling some freaky trick. My lawyer said I shouldn’t come anywhere near you.”

Eric nodded. He slid the folder across the countertop to Turtle. “You can run these by him, then, if you want.”

“What is it?”

“It’s the end. It cancels the whole thing and says you’re not liable for anything you ever acquired. Plus it admits your damage claims and returns all of your lawyer’s fees.”

Turtle gaped at him for a second, then frowned. “What, this is your idea of a joke, right?”

“No joke,” Eric said. He flipped the folder open. “I already signed. Get them signed and send it over when you can.”

Turtle looked at the papers, seemed to actually read a page. Eric glanced around the storeroom, which was stacked with shoes and smelled like wet cardboard, musty. He’d spent half his life teasing Turtle about being a lazy asshole, but Jesus, he didn’t want him ending up here, 30-something and working retail. “I don’t get it,” Turtle said, finally.

“I’m an ass,” Eric said. “I’ve been an ass. I’ve been — pretty fucking terrible. This should stop. It’s ridiculous.” He spread his hands out on the counter. “I’m turning things around, and this is — it felt like the place to start.”

The folder was still between them. Turtle flipped to the back page, which was actually just a check, enough to get a car and a down payment on a decent place to live. Lloyd had confirmed that Eric could easily afford it. “That’s yours,” Eric said. “No matter whether you sign or not. We’re — we were best friends, man, our fortune should have always been yours.” 

Turtle swallowed. “This is — I don’t know what to say. Do you, like, are you dying or something? Is something wrong with Vince?”

“No,” Eric said. “I mean — things are bad with us, but I’m working on that, too. In fact — I know you probably can’t ever, like, forgive me, but if you can see your way to letting things slide with him, you should. He could probably use a friend, you know?”

“Yeah,” Turtle said. He shook his head. “I don’t know what to say, E.”

“Don’t say thank you,” Eric said. “I don’t think I could fucking take it. Just, uh, run them by your guy, get stuff notarized, and call me — or Lloyd, if you don’t want —” He stopped, because he felt weirdly choked up at the idea that Turtle wouldn’t want to talk to him. “I can let you get back to work,” he said, stepping backwards.

Walking out of the store, he didn’t exactly feel better. If anything, seeing Turtle at work had driven home what a fucking bastard he’d been in this fucked up version of L.A. Lloyd was waiting outside, and he drove Eric to an upscale tourist hotel. The whole way there, he talked about business, about the projects Eric was currently involved in — the production shingle he and Vince shared was, apparently, a very big deal — and the movie he was supposed to start shooting in the fall. Eric tried to pay attention, but nothing Lloyd was saying seemed to make sense. He wasn’t  _really_ famous. He couldn’t be. That was Vince’s deal.

Eric told Lloyd they’d pick up again tomorrow, turning down his offer to get some dinner sent over. “I’m pretty sure I can find the delivery menus myself, but thanks,” he said. He squeezed Lloyd’s shoulder. “Remind me tomorrow, whatever you’re making, you need a serious raise.”

He took the briefcase and bag that Lloyd or someone under Lloyd (could it be possible that his assistant had an assistant?) had packed for him and went up to his room, which was actually a suite and not the plain affair he was expecting. He knew he should open the briefcase, set up the computer that was inside, look over the spreadsheets Lloyd had provided to figure out exactly what he did and what he made, but he was exhausted. He threw everything into the corner, grabbed a beer from the minifridge, and turned on the television. What he really wanted to do was call Vince, get him over here, and just somehow get a do-over. Clearly, this bizarro bastard Eric would need to start from absolute fucking scratch — would possibly need some kind of lobotomy — if things were going to work out, and he couldn’t think of any way to do that. He wasn’t sure that brain-damaging himself would fix things, or, well, he thought he might try it. 

He’d have to pump Lloyd for more information tomorrow.

For now, he finished his beer, then drained a tiny bottle of Jack out of the same mini-bar, and fell asleep in the hotel bed, missing home.

* * *

 

He woke up early and called for room service, then for Lloyd. He took a shower and, after that, took a hard look at himself. This was not the body he had in his own world. If Vince was at his peak physical potential here, so, it seemed, was Eric: his chest was well-defined, his arms and legs were hard and scultped. Experimentally, he dropped and started counting push-ups; when Lloyd arrived, he was just counting off 124, and had only just broken a sweat.

“Do you want me to keep your appointment with the trainer for today?” Lloyd asked, holding his Palm Pilot at the ready.

Eric stood and pulled on a T-shirt. “I don’t know. How weird is it if I cancel?”

“You cancel things all the time,” he said. “Business comes up.”

Eric nodded. “Cancel, then,” he said. “Let’s talk about this business stuff.”

He’d had a look at some of the papers over breakfast, so when Lloyd started talking about the in-process projects again, Eric knew them by name. He tried not to be surprised by the names of his collaborators, but really, he was: the elite directors and producers of Hollywood were apparently his inner business circle. As offended as he was by the majority of this life, he understood, a little, how this Eric could be impressed and enamored and protective of it all.

“So I’m a hotshot,” Eric said, and Lloyd nodded.

“You won the —”

“Lloyd, I get that the résumé is impressive,” Eric said tiredly. “But right now I’m more worried about fixing this stuff with Vince.” Lloyd nodded, slowly. “So, let’s get some basics. What’s our arrangement?”

“Arrangement? Oh. Well, you’ve had a civil union for five years, and you’re supposed to be re-married this fall. You’ve been planning the wedding for the past few months.”

“Wedding, really?” Lloyd nodded. “And now he’s leaving me.”

“Oh, that happens,” Lloyd said dismissively. “It’s a volatile relationship. But he doesn’t really have anywhere to go.”

“What do you mean? He’s — I looked at that stuff, he’s made some seriously successful movies in the past few years.” No mention of  _Aquaman_  or  _Medellin_ , Eric had noticed, but a lot of big-money box office hits with big awards attached. Vince’s dreams had pretty much come true: he’d worked with DeNiro and was starting a job with Clint Eastwood in the fall.

“Most of that has gone into your joint investments, which you control.” Lloyd shrugged. “You’re very good with money.”

Eric could hear himself making exactly that case to Vince, in either world. “So — let me get this straight. The house we live in, that’s — “

“Yours,” Lloyd said.

“Really?”

“And the apartment in New York, and the flat in London.” Lloyd pocketed his Palm and crossed his hands on the table. “I think the cabin at Aspen is in his name, but that’s because you never go there.”

Eric felt a headache starting. This was worse than he’d thought. A wedding coming up and everything already settled into his name — poor Vince didn’t stand a chance. “Do we have a financial guy? Someone I trust — no, someone who’s trustworthy?”

Lloyd nodded. “Clarence,” he said. “He’s your personal attorney and financial planner.”

“Get him,” Eric said. “Have him clear his afternoon.”

“What are you —”

Eric shrugged. “I’m going to get started on fixing this,” he said. “Hey, can you get me the wedding plans, too?”

“Absolutely.”

So after lunch in the suite — which Eric finally persuaded Lloyd to eat with him, even though this Eric apparently always ate alone — Lloyd drove them over to Eric’s offices, because it would be very out of the ordinary for him to meet anyone at a mid-level hotel. Eric had expected an office similar to the one he had with Vince now, maybe a little nicer. Instead, what he had was the entire top floor in a very upscale building, comparable to Ari’s MGA digs. He took Lloyd’s advice and pretended to be on his phone as he walked through, which saved him from any awkward encounters, and they walked past at least a dozen cubicles where people either looked up or looked busy as Eric passed. His office was an impressively large chrome-and-glass affair in the corner; next to his was a door with Vince’s name on it, he noticed, though Lloyd confirmed that he never used it.

The office was very neat, almost spartan, with no displayed awards or posters. Eric’s desk had two flat-screen monitors, a very expensive-looking leather chair behind it, and a telephone that looked like it could launch the space shuttle. Christ, Eric thought, I’m Ari on speed. He took a tentative seat at the desk, and Lloyd sat facing him. Eric realized at once that there was a slight angle in the floor and a little height added to the chair: he would be looking down at anyone who sat across from him.

“So this is where the magic happens, huh?” he asked, resting his hands carefully on the desktop.

The phone buzzed, and Lloyd rolled his eyes. “Let me go turn everything off,” he said. “I told Tracy no calls!”

He jumped up and raced out, and Eric was alone, suddenly, in his big empty office. He swiveled to take in his view of [Sunset], then turned back, eyes glancing from blank wall to blank space. It was all so impersonal. So — businesslike. So empty. He pulled on the top drawer and found only a collection of expensive fountain pens. The first side drawer had a stapler and other office supplies. In the one just beneath that, Eric found a stack of papers, a ledger, and, beneath all of that, a headshot of Vince. It had to be at least ten years old — it looked like it might have been a picture Vince had taken in New York, even — and in it, he didn’t even look that great. Not compared to how he looked now, not by a long shot. Eric pulled it out and set it on the desktop, noticing now that it was in a thin plastic protective sleeve and, also, that it was signed:

 

 _To E,_  
  
Always.   
  
V

 

 

Eric smoothed his fingers over the plastic. Vince must have signed this just before they’d come out here together. No wonder this Eric wanted it close. It was the first time Eric really felt a connection to this world, because this picture of Vince — young, vulnerable, eager — was one that he would have treasured, too.

Lloyd reappeared with coffee and Clarence, a tall, tanned lawyer in an expensive suit.

“Hey, E, I didn’t expect to hear from you until Friday to cancel our golf date,” he said, holding out his hand.

Eric turned the picture over before he stood to shake hands. “Well, I had some things to run by you,” he said.

“More things like yesterday?”

Eric cut a glance at Lloyd, who nodded briefly. This was the guy who’d dealt with the Turtle mess, then. “Similar,” Eric said.

“Never a dull moment with you, huh?”

“Oh, I try. You want some coffee?” Eric fell easily into a little jocular back and forth about business and life, the kind of guy stuff he was used to faking with people even back in his own L.A. Clearly this guy was someone that, like Lloyd said, this Eric was comfortable with. Eric hoped that would bode well.

He and Clarence took seats at the small conference table in the corner. Lloyd returned with coffee for them both, then looked at Eric uncertainly. Eric said, “I hope it’s OK if Lloyd sticks around. I just want him to take some notes.”

“Of course,” Clarence said. “So I’m guessing this is all business?”

“Well, maybe more personal than business,” Eric said. “I want to talk about making some changes.”

Clarence pulled a legal pad from his briefcase. “OK. What kind of changes?”

“Changes having to do with Vince.” 

Clarence raised an eyebrow. “Tell me.”

“I want to make sure he’s taken care of,” Eric said. “I want to make sure that no matter what, he leaves me or I leave him, everything gets split. Everything. No shelters, nothing hidden. He gets the house if he wants it, he gets controlling interest in the company —

“That’s more than half,” Clarence said, and Eric shrugged.

“Taken care of,” Eric said.

Clarence leaned forward. “E,” he said slowly, “if this is the type of conversation that I think it might be — I mean, if you’re planning, uh, if you know that something may —”

“Nothing’s gonna happen to me,” Eric said. “I’m not suicidal, I’m not fleeing the country, I’m not going to prison. I’m probably not even getting divorced. I just want — I want everything I own, every document I file, every scrap of every thing you can think of, I want that all to say that Vincent Chase is my partner, fifty-fifty. And I want to know that he’ll be taken care of if anything happens to us. I want you to make it iron-clad, so that after today, it’d be damn near impossible for me to change my mind, and I want you to do it as soon as possible.”

Clarence shifted. He looked surprised, uncomfortable. “What you’re talking about then, I think, is a total shift of assets. Moving things into his name, giving him control of certain areas.”

“Yeah,” Eric said. God, yes, Vince needed some kind of control here. “That sounds great.”

“We can do that,” he said. “It’s going to take some time, of course.”

“How much time?”

Clarence frowned. “I can have some papers for you by the end of the week.”

“Good,” Eric said. “That’s good. Call me as soon as it’s done — the sooner the better.”

He stood, and so did Clarence; Eric was surprised when Clarence reached over and dropped a hand on his shoulder. “E,” he said, “is everything OK?” He looked genuinely concerned.

Eric nodded. “I just — I’m turning some things around,” he said. “Before the wedding. Doing some reconciling.”

“Ah,” Clarence said, and his smile was kind. “Good for you.”

“Thanks,” Eric said. “And — listen, can we reschedule the golfing on Friday?”

Clarence laughed. “I hadn’t even cleared my calendar.”


	2. Chapter 2

Eric snuck out of the office again and went straight back to his hidden motel. He spent the evening eating room service and reviewing wedding plans. The plans were elaborate and expensive and, according to Lloyd, so top secret that none of the guests even knew that they were going to a wedding. It seemed strange to him that there was so much detail laid out here, so many should-be-romantic touches, but the more he read about it, the more cold he felt. This wasn’t the way a wedding should be between two people in love, he thought. It was a production, not a real ceremony. In spite of all the flowers and music, this read like a business merger. Eric put the papers away, drained another tiny bottle of Jack and, within a few minutes, fell asleep.

 

 

He was woken by strong hands on his shoulders, shaking him. “Eric, Jesus, wake the fuck up,” Vince was saying.

Eric opened his eyes, hoping he’d be looking up into the scraggly hair of his own Vince, in his own world. Instead he saw bright eyes and sharp cheekbones and a flush of anger and fear on the face above him. Fuck, he thought, and then said it. “What the fuck, Vince?”

“Have you been drinking?”

Eric blinked. “Uh, a little,” he said, and Vince’s eyes got even wider. He snapped back from him, stood up, crossed his arms. Eric sat up. “What are you doing here? Are you OK?”

Vince shook his head. “You promised,” he said. “You fucking — “ He stopped, very suddenly, and turned away, took two deep breaths. When he turned around, Eric could tell he was acting because the tension had left his voice, but not his shoulders. “OK. It’s OK, everyone has slip-ups. Right? So, we’ll just — have you called Clarence already?”

Eric flinched. “About what?” He couldn’t be talking about that afternoon, could he? How could he already know? “No, not tonight.”

“We’ll do that. We’ll — I’ll get some coffee sent up, and then, it’ll be fine. We’ll call him, we’ll get you to a meeting tomorrow. OK?”

A meeting. Those were words from childhood. Both Eric’s dad and Vince’s had gone to meetings, back in the day; neither had had much success with them, but just the mention of it made Eric feel a little queasy. I’m an alcoholic? he thought. Would’ve been nice of Lloyd to mention that. 

Vince sat on the bed, and through the calm acting mask Eric could sense his worry. “You can come home,” he said quietly. “We’ll get through this, OK?”

“Vince,” Eric said, and then he wasn’t sure what more to say. He couldn’t go home with him, not now, not yet. He couldn’t just go because Vince wanted to keep an eye on him. “What are you doing here?”

Vince laughed abruptly. “Clarence,” he said. “He was worried. So I called Lloyd.”

“He told you where I was?”

Vince frowned. “Don’t take it out on him, all right? I practically threatened to set him on fire. And he was worried, too. He said you were here and I should come talk to you, that was the only part that made sense,” Vince said. “I guess — did he know you were drinking?”

“I wasn’t drinking,” Eric said. “I had a drink. One.”

“It always starts with one,” Vince said.

“No, seriously,” Eric said. “Check the garbage. Check the minibar.”

Vince looked at him funny for a minute, then stood up and did just that. He counted the bottles in the minibar, even opened and tasted the booze. “OK, that’s not water,” he said, wincing as he set down a tiny Absolut right next to the papers Eric had been reviewing. Right next to, Eric realized too late, the wedding plans. 

Vince looked over at Eric, his expression guarded. “You were working on wedding stuff?” he asked.

“Sort of.”

He nodded, just once. His fingers were resting on the top sheet, and he looked there instead of at Eric. “You, uh, why? Are you changing things again?”

Eric shook his head. “I wouldn’t change anything without talking to you first,” he said, and realized how out-of-character that was when Vince turned to look at him. “I mean. Anything more.” Vince looked back at the plans, started rifling through them. “Actually,” Eric said, his voice quiet, “after today, I was sort of wondering if you even — I mean, if —”

“If we should go through with it?” Vince asked. He was still looking at the pages. “Yeah. I’ve been thinking about that, too.”

Eric took a fast breath. “What do you think?” he asked.

Vince shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. His voice was soft and somehow more familiar than the strident voice he’d heard since arriving in this world. He dropped the paper he was looking at abruptly, then took a few steps back and sat on the edge of Eric’s bed. “Things are pretty fucked up.”

Eric nodded, then realized Vince couldn’t see that. “Look,” he said, “it’s still a while away. And hardly anyone knows.”

“What, you wanna wait and see?” Vince asked, turning to look at Eric over his shoulder.

“I want — I want some time to fix things,” Eric said, feeling desperate, suddenly, like his relationship here and in his own world depended on Vince saying yes to this.

Which, after a moment, he did, albeit with a shrug. “What do you want me to do?” Vince asked.

“Nothing,” Eric said. He wanted to reach over and touch him, but he couldn’t tell if that would be welcome or normal. So he just said, “I just want you to give me another chance.”

Vince sighed. “Eric,” he said, his voice quiet and tired, “I already said you could come home. Do we have to go through this all tonight?”

“I don’t want to come home,” Eric said, and Vince flinched. “Not yet,” Eric said quickly, “not, uh, not like this. Not — not just because you think you have to keep an eye on me, or whatever.” He took a deep breath, then plunged forward. “I think — just give me a little time. I can fix things,” he said. “I swear I can fix things.”

Vince looked back at him. “I guess if anybody could,” he said, and Eric nodded. Then Vince stood up and looked around. “But seriously, can’t we at least get you a better hotel room? This place is depressing as fuck.”

Maybe that’s what I deserve, Eric thought, but he shrugged. “It’s fine. I’m just sleeping here. Otherwise I’ve got the office.”

Vince frowned. He walked to the fridge, opened it, and began taking out all of the alcohol bottles, stacking them in the ice bucket. “Don’t argue,” he said, when Eric stood and walked over. 

“I won’t,” Eric said. 

Vince shook his head. “I don’t know what’s going on with you,” he said quietly. “I don’t get it, but — if you’re serious, Eric —”

“I am,” he said, and now he did touch Vince, just on the shoulder, just to get him to turn and look at him. “I’m gonna fix things,” he said.

Vince frowned but nodded, then picked up the bucket of booze bottles. He looked down. “I want you to call me tomorrow,” he said. “OK? Will you?”

“Yeah,” Eric said. “I promise.” Vince nodded, and Eric could tell, somehow, that he didn’t believe him. “I will,” Eric said again. “When do you want me to call?”

“Whenever,” Vince said. He looked up just briefly, then glanced to the side, gripping the bucket tighter. “I’m gonna go. I should go.”

“OK,” Eric said. He kept his hands at his sides, though he wanted, again, to reach out. Vince stood still, and Eric finally realized that he was blocking his path out, and that Vince wasn’t going to move while he was there. He stepped to the side, and Vince, without saying anything, walked around him and out the door.

Eric sat on the bed. He felt shaky and a little nauseated. Vince really was afraid of him, and afraid for him. There was clearly something worth saving here, at least — which was better than what Eric had been thinking for part of the day, which was that he should find a way for this Eric to get the fuck out of Vince’s life altogether. He remembered Vince’s forced calm, remembered the way he’d said they’d get through Eric’s drinking. Fuck, somehow they’d fallen into every trap their parents had. Eric had become his own father. He couldn’t think of anything worse to discover about himself.

 

 

The next day, he had a teleconference that couldn’t be avoided, but Lloyd provided him a pretty good hand-written script as they went along and he muddled through. The end result was that he secured backing for some major project that neither he nor Vince would be directly involved in, but that would, Lloyd assured him, make a tidy profit next year, “particularly internationally.”

“This is all, like, way out of my league,” Eric admitted, leaning back in his amazingly comfortable desk chair.

“You did fine,” Lloyd said. 

Eric closed his eyes. “I’m really good at this, huh?” He knew it was true without hearing Lloyd’s obedient, expected yes. He’d felt it, a surge of — well, like a spark of knowing, or mastery, or vision, when he’d been on the conference call. He could tell that somewhere within this Eric there was a deep, comfortable familiarity with his role, here, a kind of confidence that he didn’t always have in his real life. The kind of confidence that came from power.

He sat up, abruptly, and opened his eyes. “I should get out of here,” he said. He didn’t like the feeling because, well, he liked it too much. As he stood, he wondered if maybe this Eric had replaced drinking with a different addiction, and knew the answer. He grabbed his phone off the desk, remembered his promise to call Vince. Lloyd was already standing up, and Eric waved at him to stop while Vince’s phone rang.

“Hey,” Vince said. 

“Hey,” Eric said, trying to match his cautious tone. “Uh. I just wanted, I guess, uh, I said I’d call.”

“Oh,” Vince said, and he almost sounded disappointed, or resigned. Eric realized he probably didn’t call him much during the day. “Right. OK.”

“I, uh, did I, were you doing anything? Am I interrupting —”

“Eric, do you need something?”

He held the mouthpiece away and sighed. He felt like he had, so far, walked into everything with Vince exactly wrong. All of these defenses had been built up between them. All of these layers of history. They needed a fresh start so badly, Eric thought, but — where did people generally start?

“You wanna grab lunch?” he asked, and then held his breath.

“Uh, OK,” Vince said, after a minute. “That’d be good.”

They met at some place Vince suggested, a bistro that served Asian seafood dishes. Eric didn’t know what to order — nothing looked good, because none of it was food he’d ever heard of before. Vince ordered quickly and fluently, and Eric just said, “Uh, yeah, what he’s having.”

Vince frowned and held up a hand. “No, he won’t,” he said to the waiter.

Eric swallowed. Shit. Had he just walked into some kind of fight? What the fuck? “It sounded good,” Eric said, and Vince shook his head, then turned with a smile to the waiter.

“He’ll have his usual,” he said, and the waiter nodded and hurried away. Vince turned to him, one eyebrow raised. “You want to be sick?”

“What?”

“It’s like an eight on the spice scale. You’ll be up all night if you eat that stuff.” 

Eric smiled at the familiar care in Vince’s voice. “You’re right,” he said, and Vince caught his eye. For a second, Eric saw a promising flicker there — the same spark he’d felt when Vince had taken his hand at the house, on his first day — but then Vince looked down, one of his hands going to his forehead.

“What are we doing?” Vince asked, quietly. “I mean, seriously, Eric, what are we doing here?”

Eric put his hands flat on the table, trying to look as serious and open and honest as he could. “We’re — trying,” Eric said. “That’s all I want, Vince. I just — I want us to sit here, and have lunch, and just, uh, not fight. I mean, can’t we do that? We — we used to,” Eric said, and for a second, looking at Vince’s tipped down head, Eric wondered if that was even true.

The waiter came back with two cups of soup, and Vince’s head popped up. He smiled at the guy, thanked him, looked, for a second, perfectly happy.

“See,” Eric said, when the guy went away. “Like that, except not fake.”

Vince offered a small smile. “If we’re gonna be nice,” he said, “what does that leave us to talk about?”

Finally, Eric thought, safe ground. “Old stuff,” he said, and he was rewarded by Vince’s smile. 

 

* * *

 

They settled into a pattern, after that. Eric worked mornings, and with Lloyd close by he faked his way through a fair amount of important business. They cooked up a story about him doing some kind of charity film so that he could more freely cancel things without raising anyone’s ire, and he spent his afternoons wooing Vince. That was actually how Vince put it, too: “It’s like you’re wooing me,” he said one afternoon, when they’d walked out of Barney’s, Vince with two new shirts on order to be delivered the next day. Eric had bought them, after complimenting how much they brought out his eyes.

“Maybe, a little,” Eric said, and he took Vince’s hand as they walked out. He’d noticed by now that when they were out in public, Vince would often reach for his hand, and he knew it was an automatic gesture more than any sign of affection. Still, he liked it, liked being pulled along through a crowd or taking his turn, leading Vince to the car. He even liked the practiced fond look that Vince gave him whenever there were cameras around.

Which was why, when they got in the car, it hurt a little when Vince pulled away and his face slunk back into an inexpressive mask. He was less angry than he’d been on Eric’s first day, but he wasn’t any happier, and Eric couldn’t blame him.

But he had to keep trying. So they went to lunch and went shopping. They went to movies — not just premieres, but those too, and parties. Once, they went to dinner, but it was so awkward at the end of the meal when Vince went home and Eric went back to his hotel that Eric didn’t really want to try it again.

One afternoon, Eric looked across the table at Vince, who was concentrating on his grilled chicken and steamed vegetables, and wondered if Vince even actually loved him anymore. It didn’t seem like it, really. They talked easily enough, about work, about day-to-day crap, even, very carefully, about Turtle, but they didn’t laugh. They weren’t friends anymore, Eric realized, and the he had to concentrate on his food so that Vince wouldn’t see the panic on his face.

They left the restaurant and Vince got in Eric’s car, but held out a hand to keep him from pulling away. “We should talk about the wedding,” Vince said, and Eric nodded.

He wasn’t willing to cede Vince the home turf, so he said, “Come back to my place?” and Vince made a face, but nodded.

At the hotel, Eric badly wanted to offer Vince a drink, so that he could have one himself, but instead while Vince was in the bathroom he got them each a bottle of water, then went to get ice. When he came back, Vince was standing in front of the open fridge. Eric set the ice down, started to tell him he’d already grabbed him some water, but he realized what Vince was doing, checking for alcohol, and he found it strangely touching. He wondered if it would be OK to touch Vince, at this moment, this Vince who still obviously cared some for him, and he decided that it really couldn’t make anything worse, so that’s what he did — leaned in, let his hand rest in the middle of Vince’s back, and then kissed the ball of his shoulder. Vince smelled like something sweet and green, cucumbers, maybe, and under that like the sharp athletic scent of deodorant. This care, with the attention to the drinking, this was the nicest, most couple-like thing he’d seen Vince do since he’d been back, and he liked it. He had to admit, he loved it.

It surprised him when Vince turned to him, cupped his face, and kissed him. Eric was startled, but he quickly got it together and kissed back, put his hands on Vince’s slender waist and drew him closer. “Shitty, shitty motel,” Vince said, and then gripped Eric’s shoulders and pushed him back onto the bed. “If you weren’t such a stubborn fucker, we could be doing this at home.”

And then there it was, this beautiful Vince’s beautiful body, laid out on the crappy hotel bed just for him. Eric couldn’t really believe it, didn’t even trust himself to speak, just got right down to the business of worshipping that body, touching every inch he could reach with his hands and mouth. He wondered, as he heard Vince moan his name, quietly, if this was what he’d been sent here for, if this was the reconciliation they needed — and if so, if this was going to be his only chance. He put his hands on Vince’s evenly-tanned waist and kissed a line down from his navel to his cock, then took it carefully in his mouth. He didn’t have a lot of experience with this, but this Eric apparently did, because it was like a soundtrack running in the background, the way he knew what to do, how to touch Vince just right, how to move so that the moaning grew richer, louder, and finally, finally, Vince said, “E, yes,” instead of Eric, and he came.

Eric backed off and kissed his way up Vince’s heaving chest. When Vince tried to turn over he stopped him, looked him right in the eyes, and kissed him, and they did that, just that, until Vince was hard again and even then, they stayed face to face as Eric bent one of Vince’s legs up and fucked him, as slowly as he could manage with stars sparkling behind his eyes. When he came, he was shuddering and his arms wouldn’t hold him, so he slumped to his side, eyes closed, breath racing, and slid his hand down to finish Vince off again.

After a minute, Eric pulled himself together enough to look at Vince’s face. He looked — well, Eric couldn’t tell. His face was red, his eyes were closed, and he had one hand up over his mouth, touching his own lips, gently.

“Vin?” Eric said, softly. He touched his face, and Vince turned toward him, opened his eyes, and looked right at Eric. Eric had the feeling he was being searched, like Vince was looking into him, looking for something. So Eric put everything he felt into his face, every bit of affection he felt for Vince in this world or his own. And he saw Vince nod, just a tiny bit, and then he leaned up on his elbows, turned, and kissed Eric, softly, but for a long, long time.

Then, finally, Vince pulled Eric close, buried his face against Eric’s neck, and Eric stroked his back. He wanted to say something meaningful, something like how much he loved him, how much he wanted things to work. He had his mouth open when Vince slid a leg over his and said, “So Lloyd was right, huh?”

Eric cleared his throat. “About what?”

Vince rubbed his chest. “You totally switched bodies.”

“What?” 

“Lloyd, earlier, he said — he said you said you’d switched bodies, like, you were some other Eric from some other time. I thought you were playing a joke on him, or — something, but — you meant it, huh?” Vince looked up at him. 

He didn’t look afraid, or freaked out, so Eric said, “How could you tell?”

Vince smiled and set his head back down. “You haven’t given me a blow job in three years.”

Eric gasped, and then laughed. “Holy fuck,” he said.

“You kiss different, too,” Vince said.

“Better?”

“Different.” Eric turned to look at him, saw his eyes were closed. “More like when we first got together.”

Eric cleared his throat. “So when — when was that, exactly?”

Vince’s mouth twitched down into a frown. “In New York,” he said. “High school. I knew I wanted to come out here, Johnny said I should, but you — you were going to stay behind in New York.”

Eric got a story, then, that explained a lot: Instead of letting him stay behind, this Vince had asked Eric to come to L.A. not just as his friend or his guy, but as his boyfriend. Eric had to admit that would’ve worked on him in any world; he’d always wanted a commitment from Vince, had always wanted more definition in their relationship.

They’d struck a bargain, and Eric had been Vince’s manager right from the start. They’d stayed briefly with Drama, but Eric had worked night and day — catering and bartending, mostly — so that they could get a place of their own. He’d been the one who got Vince’s audition tape into the right hands, who’d found Ari, who’d found  _Sellout_ , Vince’s breakout hit. The rest of the story, Eric had heard from Lloyd already, except for the parts that really, at this point, seemed to matter.

“So what happened with us?” Eric asked. He was leaning on one elbow, looking down at Vince, his hand resting on the blanket where his fingers could just brush Vince’s forearm.

Vince sighed. “Everything,” he said. “It’s just — been harder, these last few years, to really connect. I mean — it’s not really as bad as it seems, it’s just —”

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Eric said. “Look, I’m not the world’s perfect guy, but — this Eric, he’s a fucking prick.”

“Hey,” Vince said, but Eric shook his head.

“No, I’m serious. I saw Turtle, I got the rundown from Lloyd. And —” He wondered whether to say this out loud, decided that silence wasn’t getting them anywhere. So he put his hand gently on Vince’s arm and said, “And you’re afraid of him.”

“I’m not really,” Vince said. Eric kept looking at him. “What do you want me to say? He’s a forceful guy sometimes, he —”

“He hits you,” Eric said, and even though he expected it, it still stung a little when Vince shrugged, then, finally, nodded.

“If he’s been drinking,” Vince said.

“Christ,” Eric muttered, and drew away. “Jesus Christ. I’m my father.”

“No,” Vince said. “You don’t really understand.”

“I don’t? This guy — I — he’s scared away your friends, you’re afraid of him, hell, from what Lloyd’s said half the town is, too.” Vince shrugged again, and Eric could see that his anger was bothering him. He took a few breaths to calm himself down, tried to remind himself that this Eric wasn’t really him, that this wasn’t his real life or his future or any of that.

“What’s it like where you’re, uh, from?” Vince asked.

Eric sighed. He settled on his back, still close to Vince. “It’s different. We aren’t — like this.”

“Not married?”

“Not even together,” Eric said. “I’m your manager. I don’t direct movies or anything.”

“Weird,” Vince said. “So it’s just business?”

“No,” Eric said, though it had started to feel a bit that way recently. “We’re friends, too.” Eric had been so focused on fixing things, professionally, for Vince that they hadn’t done much real hanging out of late. He spent most of his time working on the movies, the contracts, the paychecks. Was that what this was all supposed to teach him? That he needed to spend more time with Vince, as a friend? Or that he needed to pursue some deeper relationship? Surely not, he thought, thinking of the clinical wedding plans, the unhappiness here. “We still hang out. All of us. Turtle, and Drama, and you and I.”

“Johnny?” Vince’s voice got a little high. “What’s — he’s around, in your world?”

“Yeah,” Eric said. “All the time. He’s got a TV show he’s on, he’s actually doing pretty well.” He didn’t dare glance over. “What, uh, what happened with him?”

Vince sighed. “Eric doesn’t know this, but — he’s in Florida. He’s been doing dinner theater, stuff like that. I send him some money, when I can, but — it’s hard. You — he keeps a pretty close eye on money stuff.”

“Oh, yeah,” Eric said. “I meant to tell you. I switched some stuff with Clarence, about how that all works.”

“I know,” Vince said, calmly. “That’s what made me talk to Lloyd. It’s pretty out of character for you.”

“I gather.” He rubbed his face with both hands, then sat up. The reflection in the mirror was his own, but also not. “I really am a jerk,” he said.

“Sometimes,” Vince said. “But I’ve got my issues, too.”

Eric looked back at him. “When did things go so bad? When did I ever start thinking I could  _hurt_  you?”

Vince leaned back against the headboard. “The start of it all?” he said, and Eric nodded. “I skipped a meeting with a studio head to get fucked up with Turtle.” He shook his head. “You were so angry when I got back, and you’d been drinking, and you asked why I didn’t go. I told you I didn’t feel like going. You kept on about it and I, fuck, I was still kind of wasted, you know? I didn’t have any good reason for not going, I just didn’t want to, and I said that, and I said I wasn’t going to apologize and they could go fuck themselves and so could you. You just — “ he mimed a punch, then touched his cheek. “The next day —”

“Don’t,” Eric said, shaking his head, and Vince put his hand on Eric’s shoulder. “I don’t want to hear I was sweet, I was nice to you, whatever.”

“You never apologized,” he said. “If you’d been nice about it, I would have left you right then. But the next day, it was like we’d had a fight back home, it was like we both knew we’d crossed some line — which we had,  _I_  had — and that was what happened.” Eric looked back at him, and Vince shrugged. “We sat down for dinner and you said, ‘Here’s how it’s going to work,’ and you laid out a plan. You said you were through with fucking around, that if I couldn’t get my goddamned pretty ass off the fucking couch to guarantee us both a future then you were going to find some other way to play the game. You said you didn’t come out here to watch me piss everything away and you didn’t think that was why I’d asked you to come.”

“What’d you say?”

Vince shrugged again. “I said I’d do whatever you wanted, and I’d do whatever it took to make things work for us. And the agreement was, kind of, as long as I did that and you did that, we’d be OK. And so it’s only ever been when I’m not, uh, doing what I’m supposed to, or when you’ve been drinking, that we’ve had problems.”

“You’re afraid of me,” Eric murmured, and Vince put his arms around Eric from behind.

“Not you,” he said. “Him.”

“I’m the same —”

“I don’t think that’s true,” Vince said. “Look, my Eric, he’s had some shit happen that you haven’t.”

“Don’t make excuses,” Eric said savagely. 

Vince held on. “Early on, when we came out here. I think — he’s never said, but I think he did some stuff, everything he could, stuff he didn’t want to, to make sure I got a break. I think — I sometimes think we’re both still paying for that now.”

“Oh, Christ,” Eric said. It made sense to him, in a way that nothing else about this had: he would do anything for Vince, in this time or his own.

Vince kissed the back of his neck. “He’s a good man,” he said. “But he’s had a hard time.”

“I want you to be safe from him,” Eric said. “I want — I want him to be —”

“I’m fine,” Vince said. “I needed this break. Who knows what happens after this, right? But if I wake up tomorrow and I’m back with my guy, my E, then — at least, I think it’s maybe not too late for us. Because I remember, you know? He needs me as much as I need him.” He pulled back, and Eric turned to look at him. “Do you miss me? I mean, the me in your world?”

Eric swallowed. “A lot,” he said. It was strange, but he almost had to close his eyes to picture his Vince back home, his happy, safe Vince, with the beautiful messy hair and the beautiful messy career.

“I know you’ll think I’m nuts,” Vince said, “but I miss my you, too.”

Eric nearly laughed. “I do think you’re a little nuts,” he said. “But — I get it. I get what you’ve both given up, what you’re both willing to give. It’s — that’s the same, in either place.”

“Yeah,” Vince said. “Do you think you’re staying much longer?”

“I don’t know,” Eric said.

“What do you think — why do you think you’re here?”

Eric shrugged. “I thought it was, maybe, to make this all better.” He looked down at where Vince was holding him, at the way his hands folded so perfectly together with Eric’s own. “But I can’t fix this,” he said, his voice rough.

“Some things can’t get fixed,” Vince said. “It doesn’t mean they’re completely broken, though, you know? It just means — some things have to limp along. Nothing you can do.”

He bowed his head, let Vince kiss his shoulder and then rest his head there. He felt powerless, here, despite all of the power that this Eric had, powerless to stop the bad things from happening. In his own world, he’d felt that way sometimes, too, and he’d combatted it exactly the same way this Eric had, by trying harder to control things, by working harder to fix it, fix everything. There has to be a balance, he thought. There has to be a way to understand what I can do and what I can’t.

“I love him,” Vince said. “That’s been enough for me for a long time, and it’s gonna keep being enough even after you leave. But I think — you’ve done what you can, you know? So now, maybe it’s up to me.”

“I want you to be happy,” Eric said.

Vince smiled against his neck. “Now that sounds like my Eric,” he said. “Lay back down, OK?”

Eric let himself be pulled back into the bed. As he curled up with this Vince, he thought about what he’d said, about what could be fixed here. He’d done what he could. Sometimes, maybe, that was the best that could be said.

 

* * *

  
  


He woke up to the sound of the ringing telephone, and reached out, expecting to connect with the hotel phone, thinking it was his wake-up call. Instead, his hand collided with a lamp and he heard the thud of it hitting the carpeted floor. Eric opened his eyes.

His lamp. His room. His world.

He sat up, already shaking. The ringing phone was his cell phone, and Ari’s face was flashing on the screen. “If you’ve recovered from your terrible elevator ordeal yesterday, can we please finally get a fucking signature on this contract? Unless you want to lose ten million dollars —”

“Drama’s gotta be in the contract,” Eric said.

“I thought you were going to fix that.”

“No.” Eric sat up. His heart was pounding. “Ari, either Drama’s in or Vince is out. I’m not going to try and talk him into dumping his brother. If this guy wants Vince in his movie, it’s a package deal.” His hands were shaking, and Eric was worried that his voice was going to fail. “Call me back when you have that fixed,” he said, and hung up.

In the bathroom, the eyes that met his were definitely his own, as was the less freakishly fit torso and the less sculpted hair. Eric splashed water on himself to make sure he was really awake, then took a shower to be even more certain. Still in his own world. The television confirmed what Ari had said — no time had been lost. It was the morning after the day of the elevator ride, the day when Eric had wondered what it would have been like if he’d just followed Vince to L.A. the first time.

Vince. Eric needed to see him, right away. He needed to — well, he wasn’t even sure what he needed to tell him, but what he really needed, more than anything, was to be sure he was OK, that things between them were OK. So he dressed carefully in slacks and a flattering shirt, then got in his car. His hands were sweating on the wheel, but he called Vince anyway and managed to keep his voice steady as he asked about lunch. On the way over, he tried to come up with a plan, but he realized he couldn’t think of anything to say. Everything sounded ridiculous:  _Vince, I had a dream we were married. Vince, I think maybe in some other world I’m a bastard to you. Hey, remember that elevator ride yesterday? I think it fucked up my brain._

He wasn’t any closer to a story or a decision by the time he arrived, but he still rushed inside. Vince was waiting in the kitchen, and his smile was so bright and eager and unafraid that Eric felt momentarily almost woozy with relief. Thank God, he thought, thank God, he didn’t have the same dream. He realized he didn’t want to tell Vince about the world he’d been to, because he didn’t want Vince to think he was capable of any of that. He didn’t really want to believe it himself.

“Hey,” Eric said. He looked great — not the physically perfect Vince of the other world, but the comfortable Vince Eric was used to, the one he loved most. He swallowed just thinking the word love, and wondered if that was going to be a new problem for him.

“Hey, E.” Vince was still smiling at him, and Eric took a few nervous steps forward. His mind, of its own accord, flashed briefly to his memories of the night before, and he glanced away, took a seat at the island. “What are you hungry for?” 

Eric suggested pizza, because he wasn’t up to going out in public right then. He just wanted to stay at the house and be with Vince and not think about the dream. Vince made them both coffee, and then started to pour brandy into the cups, but he paused, and Eric flashed to Vince emptying out the minibar.

 "You OK?" he asked, moving closer, trying to figure out what was going on. What if Vince had had some kind of similar dream, too? What if he was just remembering now?  

Vince put his hand on Eric's shoulder. "I need to tell you some stuff," Vince said, and Eric's stomach lurched.  

"Me, too, actually," he said. "Let's go sit down."  

Vince nodded. Eric carried their drinks to the living room and took a seat on the couch. Vince sat close, so their knees brushed when Eric moved, and that was strangely reassuring. He couldn’t think of how to broach the topic of the dream, exactly, and he didn’t want to bring it up unless Vince did. So he said, as brightly as he could manage, "So, uh, are you feeling OK?"  

"I don't know," Vince said. "What is today?"  

"Thursday." Eric’s heart was pounding again. He wanted to ask why, to say, what, you don’t know what day it is?, but he knew before Vince even spoke what that meant. He’d had a dream, too. Maybe — maybe they weren’t even dreams. He felt ill at the sudden idea that this could all happen again, that he could be sent back.

"Have you ever -- had a dream, or like, something like a dream, that sort of -- you know, felt more real than, I guess, reality?"

"Last night," Eric said, and he had to put his drink down or risk spilling it, as his hands started to shake again.

Vince’s voice was eager. "Were you in New York, too?"   

 _New York?_  Eric thought.  _Home?_  "No, I was here. But -- not here like here,” he tried to explain. “Here like, if something had gone wrong." He tried to imagine what Vince was talking about. "You dreamed about New York?"  

Vince nodded. "Like you said, it was sort of -- like an alternate universe New York."   

He didn’t seem angry, Eric thought — that had to be a good sign. Surely, if he’d met the Eric that was from his world, Vince wouldn’t be sitting so close. Maybe he’d had a happy story, Eric thought. He shifted a little closer, touched Vince’s shoulder. When he didn’t startle, Eric felt relieved. “You wanna tell me?"  

“We never left," Vince said. "We had an apartment. And, you worked in a warehouse, and I was doing theater, Off-Broadway. We were -- together," he said.  

"Together," Eric murmured. He couldn’t quite look over at Vince, because he so wanted to believe he knew what that meant.

"We were in love, E," Vince said, his voice soft and serious.   

"Yeah." Eric's relief expanded to his chest. They’d been in love. Vince had that same memory. Maybe — maybe it would be enough, maybe these dreams had been enough to make things happen here, too. He squeezed Vince’s shoulder. "In mine, too."  

"What was yours?"   

Eric didn’t know quite what to say. He didn’t want to talk about the bad stuff, not yet. Not until he knew what Vince’s dream had been like. "We were still here. I came out with you, from high school, and -- we were both famous." He forced a smile. "I was a director, you believe it?"  

"I always knew you had that in you."  

"Yeah?" Eric tried to keep smiling, but he shuddered, instead. Suddenly he didn’t want his own Vince to think anything like the Vince of that world. He wanted to show that his had been an impossible scenario. "But things were bad. With us. With everything, really. The guys -- " He shook his head. "It was just really bad," he said. "You were leaving me." He looked for some sign of disgust or recognition on Vince’s face, and was met only with curiosity and puzzlement. "Were things bad, in your dream?"  

"No," Vince said. "Well, I mean -- there was bad stuff.” He told Eric that they’d been kicked out as teenagers, that they’d found some shitty apartment, that Vince had been mugged and beat up on the way home from the subway and left with permanent scars. Eric reached for Vince without event thinking about it.   "We took care of each other,” Vince said. “It was -- I don't know, E, it was kind of sweet."  

"Sounds like a dream,” Eric said, his voice already breaking, “compared --" He couldn’t go any further. How could he tell Vince that in his world, the guy who’d hurt Vince the most was Eric? He had to turn away. It was too fresh, still, the stories, the hurt in Vince’s voice, how fucked up and broken they’d become. 

Vince put his hands on Eric’s shoulders, then started, gently, to rub. He made a soft, soothing noise, and Eric nodded. I’m here, he thought, I’m here, we’re safe, he’s fine. We’re OK. He put his hand over Vince’s, just to remind himself, and then was struck by how unusual this was — before last night, they’d never even talked about hooking up, and now Eric wanted to turn around and wrap his arms around Vince, cuddle in close, intimate. And Vince seemed willing, if the kiss that fell onto Eric’s neck was any sign. 

He cleared his throat, still not trusting that everything was OK, that anything could be easy. Maybe he was reading things wrong. "So what now?"  

"Now we learn from our mistakes," Vince said.

Eric felt all of the tension in his shoulders just fall out, down into his chest, and as he tried to breathe in he sobbed instead. He didn’t want to ever go back to where he’d come from; he didn’t ever want to be without this Vince, his Vince, ever again. He pulled him closer, looked down at the hands that were so much the same as those of the Vince he’d left behind. He wondered how he was doing. “I would never – the stuff – it was terrible,” Eric said.

“You’re here, now,” Vince said. “We’re here to stay. E, we’ve made all the right decisions. That’s what I learned. What’d you learn?“

“I need to be nicer to Drama,” Eric said, and Vince laughed, but Eric couldn’t bring himself to do anything but hold still and wish that his eyes would dry up. He wanted to tell Vince everything, so that he could apologize, so that he could somehow make it better, make it less  _real_  in his own mind. 

But before he could say anything, Vince started talking against his shoulder. “I love you, E. You know? I loved you in New York, in my dream, but — right now, here, you make me happy and I love you. I love what we’ve got, what we’ve done, what we’re going to do.”

“Yeah,” Eric said, tears so tight in his throat that he could barely speak. He ducked and kissed Vince’s hands, instead of talking, and Vince squeezed him and then let him turn around and do exactly as he’d wanted, curl up against him, tight in his arms. Eric was afraid to close his eyes, in case this was the dream, in case he was going to wake up back in the fucked up world, but Vince held onto him and told him more about his New York, and Eric finally started to relax. He slipped into sleep without even noticing it, and woke in the morning in the exact same place, both arms still tight around Vince’s chest, Vince’s heartbeat under his ear.

“I love you, too,” Eric said, and when Vince woke up he was already smiling.

“I know,” Vince said. “I pretty much always knew.”

“Even lately, when you wanted to kill me?” Eric asked.

Vince laughed. “Even then. You — I know you’re just trying to make things better, make things happen.”

Eric frowned. “I know I get kind of crazy about business stuff some times,” he said. “I swear, I’m gonna work on it. I can change. I don’t want that to be my life. Our life.”

“Our life,” Vince said, and he smiled. “I like the sound of that.”

“Yeah? Me, too,” Eric said.

“Good, because I’m not sure after all this I can really let you out of my grasp for a while,” Vince said.

Eric laughed, for the first time in what felt like years. “I’m OK with that,” he said, his hand cupping Vince’s chin, and then he kissed him, and it wasn’t at all like the other world; it was better, because it was real.


End file.
